2. I have since staring my blog, always put a tiny image into each news post. They are NOT featured images but simply inserted in the post. Will they show up in a list of posts (I have found that some themes show these non-featured images in the post list and some don't. It would be a pain to go back 3000 entries and set them as 'featured')?

However, read-access to the premium themes forum is now open to all users so you can search to see if your question has been previously asked and answered there. The premium theme forums are at http://premium-themes.forums.wordpress.com/ with separate sections for each theme.

If you are not successful when searching there note that after one purchases a premium theme there is a link for the specific Premium Theme support forum for the theme under Appearance -> Themes in their blog’s Dashboard, but do note that the premium theme must be active and they must be signed in as the user who purchased it in order to see it and post to it.